u/babyinatrenchcoat

New nanny starts on Monday (yay!) Part-time at 5 hours a day Mon-Fri. No contract.

Her daughter is getting married the first week of September so she’ll be out of town that whole week.

And then I’m going on a work trip the second week of September so I’ll be out of town that whole week and my mom is flying in to watch baby, dog, & house.

How do I handle pay for this?

Do I just go ahead and still pay for both weeks?

Do I not pay for the week she’s out of town since she’s asking to take off but pay for the week my mom is in town since I’m asking her to take off?

First-time nanny employer and want to make sure I do it right and fair. Thank you!

ETA: Since the job is part-time and only until the end of January, she’s approached everything very laissez faire. However, y’all have convinced me to require a contract and include in it clauses clarifying PTO and Sick time.

My girl just turned 5 months.

Yesterday I started back to work and she started daycare.

I did a ton of research and tours and found a place I really liked and that I could afford (solo mom with no local village).

Met with her caretakers yesterday and everything seemed great. They have the app that logs bottles/diapers/naps/etc as well as a live feed app for the in-room camera (controversial, I know, but a selling point for me).

They didn’t have me set up just yet yesterday so today I was able to log in for the first time.

The app limits you to ten 10-minutes viewing sessions for the day which I get and wasn’t planning on even opening it that much.

Until I had to.

At first it was my baby being left to cry in the crib, a binky repeatedly popped into her mouth to try and stop the crying, or being set crying on the floor mid-feed to tend to another baby.

Which I understand just happens in a 1:4 infant daycare room. My baby will have to occasionally cry or wait while other babies are also cared for. I don’t necessarily *like* it, but I get it and would deal.

Until one time I logged in and saw that my baby was asleep in the crib…face down.

During her first day yesterday, when I met with her caretakers and told them about her, I explained that she has severe reflux and goes to PT for Torticollis and as such she can’t yet roll or push herself up during tummy time. They acknowledged understanding.

And yet there was my baby screaming face down in a mattress she couldn’t push herself off of to breathe.

I called the center and told the front desk what was happening and they ran into the infant room to alert the caretakers. All the front desk told me was that she’d “just woken up” and they got her out.

Shaken, I decided to go pick her up early. When I got there, they said they were doing tummy time and she fell asleep like that (they do tummy time on the floor mat, not in a crib).

And that they’d didn’t know she couldn’t roll or push up yet (I told them this literally yesterday) but that they had an eye on her and she was fine (I watched them take a baby out of the crib next to hers and play with that baby on the floor, not once checking on my baby).

What really happened is my baby is the youngest baby in that room. Age wise and developmentally. All of the other babies are mobile (rolling, crawling, walking) and at bare minimum can lift themselves up when on their stomachs.

They were used to that and forgot my baby couldn’t. So they put all of the babies on their stomachs to sleep which was safe and fine for all of the babies…except for mine. And then they got busy taking care of other babies and were going to let my baby fuss in her crib for a bit until they got to her.

Which I don’t want to think about what might have happened if I hadn’t been logged into the camera and called in.

I didn’t say anything to them right then about not bringing her back for a while. I’ll call tomorrow and let them know.

I WFH and am part-time this month while I transition back to full-time from parental leave, and had been counting on this childcare arrangement.

But now I’m tempted to move back to my home state temporarily and live with my parents as an interim childcare solution until my baby is older and I feel more comfortable taking her back to daycare (plus my mom asks all the time for us to come back so she can see her grandbaby more).

The guilt is absolutely eating away at me. I’m just holding my girl right now and apologizing to her red, swollen little face for putting her through that.

I’m very pro-daycare and plan to utilize them again. But not until she’s more autonomous and not as reliant on consistent, attentive care.

Edit: I appreciate the additional insight. I had no idea it was a licensing violation to place babies on their stomachs. I assumed it was normal because one of the caretakers put them all down in a row that way (confirmed via the camera feed).

I’m doing more research into potentially nanny-sharing with another local mom in a similar situation or going ahead and temporarily moving halfway across the country to my folks’ place.

Either way, I don’t think I’ll be putting my baby back into daycare until she’s at least a year old (personal comfort level) and for sure not at this daycare.

Especially when I start back at work in 2 weeks.

Solo parent no village. 4.5 month old.

When does it get better?

sleep: 7:25 pm - 11:10 pm (3h 45m)
awake: 11:10 pm - 11:15 pm (5m)

sleep: 11:15 pm - 11:25 pm (10m)
awake: 11:25 pm - 11:30 pm (5m)

sleep: 11:30 pm - 11:40 pm (10m)
awake: 11:40 pm - 11:45 pm (5m)

sleep: 11:45 pm - 12:00 am (15m)
awake: 12:00 am - 12:05 am (5m)

sleep: 12:05 am - 12:15 am (10m)
awake: 12:15 am - 12:50 am (35m)

sleep: 12:50 am - 3:25 am (2h 35m)
awake: 3:25 am - 3:45 am (20m)

sleep: 3:45 am - 5:00 am (1h 15m)
awake: 5:00 am - 5:05 am (5m)

sleep: 5:05 am - 6:15 am (1h 10m)
awake: 6:15 am onward

My EBF 4.5 month old could go a month without pooping if I let her.

Usually around days 3-5 she’s showing obvious signs of discomfort so I use a Windi to help her go. Normal consistency albeit atrocious smell.

She also has severe reflux and this all started around the time she began Famotidine (although that’s not supposed to be a side effect?).

I’ve added in probiotic drops and Mylicon.

Nada.

Hot baths, stretches, a thousand bicycle legs per day, tummy massages, and even reflexology out of desperation (she appreciated a foot massage if nothing else).

Had her 4-month shots this week and talked to her pediatrician about it who suggested mixing 0.5oz of prune juice with 0.5oz of water (and a CMPA test which was negative).

I have to use a syringe to even try and feed this to her she hates it so much, and then 20 minutes later she vomits it all back up. So that’s not working…

The projectile spit-up 80 times a day was already a lot, but is this just our life until her GI system matures?